Professional Documents
Culture Documents
A bimonthly publication of the Kern-Kaweah Chapter of the Sierra Club — Sept–Oct 2008
Midgebuzzings
MY GARAGE DOOR opens to an alley. One day last month as I was preparing to drive out, I heard a high-
pitched commotion. There, just at the back of the garage, was a terrified baby bird, obviously evicted
from his nest by circumstance and way too young to fly. My reaction was what anyone’s would be: both
startled and dismayed. What can one do with a helpless, flightless creature like that? A quick and
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merciful stomp? A hard whack with a shovel? I remembered what a high school friend did upon seeing a
jeering mob of campus yahoos surrounding a very injured and flailing pigeon. He parted the crowd,
picked up the bird and wrung its neck with a quick twist. Then he took my arm and led me away from
the startled idiots before they could realize that they had been outdone by a better man. I still admire him
for that, though I could never have done it myself. Nor could I have done it to the shrieking and
desperate little creature that morning.
A little later, the bird was in a cat carrier on my guest bathroom sink where my two felines could not get
at him, and I, muttering and resentful, was on my way to the corner grocery for some jars of Gerber’s
Baby Food. I had been advised of this diet by a friend who is by nature and habit a rescuer of
defenseless creatures. At home again I mixed a little beef in a shot glass with rice and lentils and a bit of
warm water, and with an eyedropper drew up a good portion of the brew. The baby opened his over-
sized beak, the eyedropper went in as far as I dared, and down the hatch went the appalling concoction.
When he’d had enough, he shook his head and Gerber’s went all over the sink, the wall and even the
window screen. This charming exercise became a daily and nearly hourly routine.
For the next two weeks I took the bird out of the carrier every morning and set him in the screened
bathroom window so that he could look out on trees, hear the rustle of leaves and catch a glimpse of
other birds. Soon he could flutter to the top of the sink, and then to the floor.
One afternoon I walked in to find that he had vanished. I opened the door again to admit one of the cats,
who had been stationed outside since day one listening intently for the rustle of wings. She came in and
paused, then pointed almost the way a dog would do. I put her out again and found the little rogue
perched on a slender pipe that leads from the back of the toilet to the wall.
Soon he could fly from the window to the top of the carrier where he would stay, being unready to make
the return flight which required more skill. But at last one day I heard a rush of wings, pushed aside the
excited cat and entered to find that Birdie had passed the ultimate flight test by landing in the window
with perfect accuracy. At that point, I opened the screen and he flew out with a wild and beautiful rush
right into the trees from which he had probably fallen. Then I set to work with Clorox and scrubbers to
reclaim the spare bathroom for unsuspecting guests. The hardest part was the screen.
Some bird babies look alike to me, so I’m hoping he was a robin and not a starling. Still, the true Samar-
itan never asks.
Ann Williams
Jean Bennett, long time member and Owens Peak Treasurer, passed away Friday
morning, July 18th. She was a Sierra Club life member and a renowned optical scientist.At
Jean’s request, no service is planned.
Executive Committee
of the Kern-Kaweah Chapter
Chair: Arthur Unger (Bksf), 661.323.5569. Vice-
chair: Gordon Nipp (Bksf), 661.872.2432. Secre-
tary: Georgette Theotig (Tehachapi), 661.822.4371.
Treasurer: Lorraine Unger (Bksf), 661.323.5569.
Donnel Lister (Bksf), 661.831.6784. Richard Garcia
(Min King), 559.592.9865. Ara Marderosian (Kern-
ville), 760. 378.4574,
THE ROADRUNNER 8
Chapter Ex-com Meetings: All Sierra Club
members are always welcome to attend.
Next meeting: Saturday, Sept. 6
Call 661.323.5569 or e-mail artunger@att.net to
confirm all meeting dates, as well as location and
time of day.
Sierra Club Calendars 2009 will again be available
for sale. Please call Georgette Theotig to arrange for
your purchase. 661.822.4371.
NEWS IN A NUTSHELL
******* New Co-editors of the Roadrunner Announced ********
contact address sierraroadrunner@gmail.com
Welcome to new editors of Roadrunner. Marjorie Bell, former head of Kern County High School
English Department and Dinah Campbell, graphic artist, both long-time Sierra Club members, will
begin their new “careers” as editors with the November-December issue. We are very fortunate to have
these experienced and willing persons to continue with the traditions of informing our Chapter members
as to the concerns and accomplishments of our Chapter and its Groups. Many thanks to all of you who have
contributed your time and efforts to the Roadrunner these past years. Do know you are very much appreciated.
Most sincerely, Mary Ann Lockhart
GEOL 35B: Geology of Kern County Course offered by Bakersfield College. A study of the geo-
logic history and landforms of Kern County, and the geologic forces and processes that created them.
Course may be taken for either standard letter grade or credit/no credit. Meets: Tuesday afternoons Sept
16–Oct 25th. Saturday field trip to be scheduled.
Fees: Approx. $35. www.bakersfieldcollege.edu www2.bakersfieldcollege.edu/nbursztyn
All of that is now so-o-o-o 20th century. The 21st century is the beginning of the clean tech revolution and we must now learn
to navigate the carbon world. Sadly, the U.S. is nowhere in the lead. It is the Kyoto Protocol nations driving the reins and
leaving the U.S. choking in CO2 dust, having concluded from a government perspective that climate change is real and is a
global problem that requires global solutions. It is the Kyoto Protocol nations laying down the foundations for a new
economic system based on a carbon market. The basis is to cap CO2, or carbon emissions a.k.a. GHG (greenhouse gas)
emissions, ultimately to reduce it to a carbon-free world. The strategy is a free market trading system based on market value
THE ROADRUNNER 9
of carbon, which fluctuates up and down similar to stock market commodities. Much of the world has taken on caps, the U.S.
has not.
Not waiting for the U.S. to wake up is California, when in 2006 Assembly Bill 32 (AB 32) was signed into law. AB 32 may
well be the most significant piece of legislation driving the U.S. to finally take responsibility for climate change. Simply
stated, AB 32 places a cap on carbon emissions in California and requires the Air Resources Board (ARB) to develop a plan
to reduce GHG emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, and further reduce to 80% below 1990 levels by 2050. This is huge. This
means the typical 13.5 tons/person will be reduced to 1.5 tons/person.
WHAT IS AHEAD?
The Scoping Plan will be the ARB doctrine and must be adopted by Jan 1, 2009. Most likely will be a trading system based
on caps and offsets. ARB will hold workshops around the state during the summer and open for public comments in October.
For the enviro geek, the idea of carbon as a market commodity is very unnerving. You're supposed to pay for pollutants, not
make money from it. From a capitalist viewpoint, it makes sense. The carbon market has spawned a whole new industry.
Foremost is The Climate Registry and the California Climate Action Registry (CCAR), which sets the standards for
measurement, verification, and reporting of GHG emissions so all entities are playing the same field. Another key player is
Point Carbon, a sort of clearinghouse for worldwide carbon news, trade analysts, and market forecasting. Then there are the
banks that hold the carbon offset credits, energy certificates, and emission allowances. Similar to the Wall St. transaction
board, there is the carbon transaction board where one can find all the trading data. There are the major utilities - SCE,
PG&E, Sempra, the big oil companies - Chevron, BP, all scrambling to be green.
There are numerous entrepreneurial businesses, including one founded by several castaways of Enron. It was after the fall,
and a few engineers and finance professionals started meeting at IHOP to figure their future. They saw energy efficiency
glistening in their syrup and started a company that designed and developed tools for industry to track, monitor, and report
sources of energy usage. Having this type of data allows companies to better manage their energy usage. Utility companies
will soon introduce this tool to the consumer with their "smart connect" program. All meters will be replaced with new
meters with a computer system that allow customers to see usage and from what appliance.
Clean tech companies are sprouting like wildflowers and when there is money to be made the venture capitalists are there.
According to Daniel Dudek with the Environmental Defense Fund "the carbon market may be the largest economic
opportunity of the 21st Century".
Yet, there are important questions. Is an active cap and trade market really an answer? Since the time when we
began to realize the perilous implications of global warming, we have been accustomed to think of the abundance
of carbon in the atmosphere as a negative. We certainly did not universally imagine it to be a highly valued
commodity, but it seems to be. According to several of the presenters, cap and trade was first successfully
practiced here in the U.S. under the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments, in order to mitigate the environmental
damage caused by acid rain. The Economist said of the program, “probably the greatest green success story of the
past decade.” (July 6, 2002).
Maybe because environmentalists usually consider themselves “science types” rather than “business or money
types” there were not too many of the former at this international and decidedly “business” conference. In fact,
environmentalists were just plain scarce. Included in the minority, there were two Sierra Club attendees (the
writers of this article) and speaker Carl Zichella, a Sierra Club Regional Manager. Zichella’s was a unique and
welcomed voice from the podium, as he spoke of the social concerns that may accompany capitalistic venture in
the name of saving the planet. Not yet a convert to cap and trade, he is keeping an open mind. Zichella is inclined
to think of the market approach as a solution more like “buckshot” rather than a
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“silver bullet”.
There is good reason for concern and reason enough to proceed with caution. First of all, anyone who has lived in
these last ten years or so will know that for the average investor and even the experts, Wall Street can be a
treacherous place. If these market schemes (they actually used the word scheme repeatedly to describe cap and
trade models, hmmm….) are to work, then there must be tough and thorough government regulation. Aside from
the earlier mention made of the benign and entrepreneurial ex-Enron employees attending the conference;
permeating those opulent Marriot meeting rooms, there was always a just barely perceptible whiff of the ghost of
Enron. Hopefully, we have learned well from the Enron debacle and the pain resulting from deregulation (and
manipulation) of the electricity markets in the not too distant past. There is just no room here for shell games,
revolving door regulators, or wink and nod cronyism. There is far too much at stake. And although it’s nowhere
near as sexy or glamorous as the trading game, let’s not forget the tried and true value of conservation.
We are at a crossroads. As we shed our oil addiction, there will be opportunities and whole new vistas that we are
only beginning to imagine. Big oil and utilities are going to want to keep the upper-hand position they now
hold…not to mention the extraordinary profits the oil companies have grown accustomed to. We may find that it
makes more environmental sense for people to generate their own power in their own communities. In order to
keep the status quo, will we use the capital generated through cap and trade to finance large, remote energy
infrastructure and delivery systems, even though these methods of reducing CO2 may nevertheless degrade the
environment (i.e., wildlife habitat destruction)? Or will we carefully explore all avenues of power generation and
utilize only those that are best for the planet and the people on it? If citizens do not demand a voice in the process,
it may be “business as usual”, with all the power (the human and the generated kind) continuing to remain in the
hands of the highest bidder. I don’t think any of us want to see the utility companies become the next generation
of oil barons. Could it be that John Lennon was literally foretelling the future when he said “Power to the
People”?